In inner-Biblical interpretation edit

 
The Return of the Israelite Spies (woodcut by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld from the 1860 Bible in Pictures)

Numbers chapter 13 edit

Numbers 13:1–14:45 and Deuteronomy 1:19–45 both tell the story of the spies. Whereas Numbers 13:1–2 says that God told Moses to send men to spy out the land of Canaan, in Deuteronomy 1:22–23, Moses recounted that all the Israelites asked him to send men to search the land, and the idea pleased him.

Numbers chapter 14 edit

In the Hebrew Bible, God’s reference to Caleb as “my servant” (עַבְדִּי, avdi) in Numbers 14:24 echoes God’s application of the same term to Abraham[1] and Moses.[2] And later, God uses the term to refer to Moses,[3] David,[4] Isaiah, [5] Eliakim the son of Hilkiah,[6] Israel,[7] Nebuchadnezzar,[8] Zerubbabel,[9] the Branch,[10] and Job[11]

Numbers chapter 15 edit

Exodus 35:3 prohibits kindling fire on the Sabbath. Numbers 15:32–33 reports that when the Israelites came upon a man gathering wood on the Sabbath (apparently with the intent to fuel a fire), they brought him before Moses, Aaron, and the community and placed him in custody, “because it had not been declared what should be done to him.”[12] Clearing up any uncertainty about whether the man had violated the law, God told Moses that the whole community was to stone him outside the camp, and they did.[13]

Notes edit

  1. Genesis 26:24.
  2. Numbers 12:7, 8.
  3. Joshua 1:2, 7; 2 Kings 21:8; Malachi 3:22.
  4. 2 Samuel 3:18; 7:5, 8; 1 Kings 11:13, 32, 34, 36, 38; 14:8; 2 Kings 19:34; 20:6; Isaiah 37:35; Jeremiah 33:21, 22; 33:26; Ezekiel 34:23, 24; 37:24; Psalm 89:3, 20; 1 Chronicles 17:4, 7.
  5. Isaiah 20:3.
  6. Isaiah 22:20.
  7. Isaiah 41:8, 9; 42:1, 19; 43:10; 44:1, 2, 21; 49:3, 6; 52:13; Jeremiah 30:10; 46:27; Ezekiel 28:25; 37:25.
  8. Jeremiah 25:9; 27:6; 43:10.
  9. Haggai 2:23.
  10. Zechariah 3:8.
  11. Job 1:8; 2:3; 42:7, 8.
  12. Numbers 15:34.
  13. Numbers 15:35–36.